I hadn’t even heard of The Third Man until Netflix told me I’d like it. I decided to give it a shot. I mean, it’s got Orson Welles and Joseph Cotten from Citizen Kane, and the reviews are pretty darn positive, so there must be something to it.
Fortunately for Netflix (we’re still on the outs since The Treasure of the Sierra Madre), I liked The Third Man quite a lot. The zither music throughout the film set it apart as a film, and I was delighted at what I saw. (BTW, it’s rated A for Adults.)
Set during the post-World War II occupation of Vienna, the film follows American author Holly Martins (played by Joseph Cotten, below) as he tries to figure out how his friend died. Before long, Holly is caught up in a web of lies so complex that even the audience isn’t sure if he’s right.
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And that’s the film’s first success. Before I got the DVD I knew that the accident that killed Harry Lime, and even the fact that he died, was in question. I also knew that the part of Harry Lime (what a great name) was played by Orson Welles, so Harry would obviously be making an appearance. Still, I found myself questioning everything right along with Holly. Was Harry murdered? And by whom? For what reason?
Alida Valli, the actress who played Harry’s love interest Anna, has a haunting, troubled beauty. She knows things as they are, not as she wishes them to be. In occupied Vienna, she knows that things like the black market and forged papers are necessary. But with American ideals that see the city from across the ocean, Holly would claim that morality is binary; either a thing is right or it is wrong.
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The occupying forces, of course, agree with Holly. They’re bringing Vienna back from the brink of barbarism, and their rules are there for a reason. What they cannot see, or at least cannot acknowledge, is that their laws may work when looking at the grand scheme, but also crush the people with their rigidity.
Major Calloway and Sergeant Paine (pictured above) are, then, in an impossible position. They’re the middlemen who see the hardship on the street while also seeing the ideal being propped up. They understand why people must circumvent legal means of trade, but see the importance of shutting down the black market.
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And that’s where Harry Lime comes in. Harry is the underbelly of the black market personified. He’s in Vienna to make a buck, plain and simple. If someone gets hurt in the process, then that’s just the price we pay for society’s advancement.
This is what makes The Third Man successful. It’s a seemingly simple problem, but writer Graham Greene and director Carol Reed present it within a story of intrigue that both complicates and finally answers it with a breathtaking chase through the sewers of Vienna and a long walk after a funeral.
Dark and humorous, beautiful and cynical, this classic noir is a film of contradiction. Give it a look and see if you agree.
